Courting Kel Read online

  “I thought Basalia should see what she might trade for. This all-weather blanket is the most transportable…unless you don’t want me to bring it?”

  “There is room. Ready?”

  She nodded. At the spaceship’s hatch, she glanced back at the lodge, already missing her shiny green sarong and her multicolored gown. Had she kept the homespun tunic she’d arrived in, she’d take nothing Aren had given her; but since arriving on Amazonia naked was not an option, Kel wore the leather pants, vest and boots he’d bestowed. She intended to return them when she had other clothing. She’d gladly return the boots that had given her blisters and now felt sizes too small.

  Aren’s shoulders were so wide he had to walk sideways to his pilot’s seat. He buckled her into the body-hugging chair to his right then settled in himself.

  “You’re coming with me?”

  “Of course.”

  Ignoring the spurt of happiness in her heart, she stared at the buttonless dashboard and wondered how Aren would control the ship. He laid his hands on the smooth surface and Kel felt a little jerk.

  “Neat trick,” she said, wiggling until her chair conformed perfectly to her body. Aren’s needed no adjustments. He lifted a finger, opening the view screens. Kel gasped, stunned at seeing a horizon where night met day in a sharp line.

  Striving to seem as if she had taken many interplanetary flights, Kel said, “How long will it take to get to Amazonia?”

  “A few hours.”

  “I had no idea—it took Tage days.”

  “He made several stops between Endura and Ondrican. And he had to remain in orbit for—”

  “The Choosing. Jocelyn explained.”

  He turned his head to look at her. She gave him her profile, not wanting him to see her fuming. Aren said Tage had stopped on Endura where he had taken her aboard The Herald. And had her examined by Storr’s physicians! Tage knew exactly where she’d boarded. Guanshit blackguard lied to me!

  “The ship will alert us when we reach your homeworld. Not having slept much last night, I’m going to sleep now.” He touched the control panel then leaned back to settle more comfortably in his pilot seat.

  “Mmm.” He looked well rested to her. Wretched man. Despite the care she had taken with her hair, her eyes were red from crying and the swelling had only begun to lessen when she boarded his ship. Not that she expected her hair to impact her face…but she’d hoped her neat braid would make her feel better and feeling better would erase all signs of misery. Only the gods knew how Basalia would react when she saw Kel.

  Hearing Aren’s gentle snores, she slanted him a resentful glare. The noise would probably keep her awake, but closing her eyes might lessen their swollen redness.

  Having faked his snores, Aren sensed the minute Kel fell asleep. Gazing at her, part of him wanted to set a course for the real Amazonia where he could rid himself of her forever. Another part wanted to return to Ondrican, empty the Princesses’ Palace and make love to her in every single bedroom.

  Rid. Forever. One of those words he already hated.

  He looked at her again. Her heavy braid rested on her left breast, rising and falling with every breath. In repose, her face seemed more trusting, more childlike. He wondered what color her eyes would be if she awakened now and found him staring at her.

  Would she have forgiven him for storming off last night? He should have stayed with her. Found a way to make her laugh. Made her tell him why she’d run away from him. Cuddled her until they both fell asleep and the prophecy cloth covered them in dreams of such exquisite fulfillment Kel would never leave him.

  Ha! It would take more than talking to make Kel accept him as her soul mate. He should have discouraged Drew, forbidden her to weave the cloth in the first place. Not that he knew about it beforehand. But the girl—young woman, he reminded himself—had never had a constant female presence in her life. The cloth was a gift from her heart. Aren felt guilty for depriving her of Kel. Even though Tage held responsibility for his daughter’s welfare, Aren could have left Drew with Caton and Jocelyn all year-round. But Drew was as much his child as Tage’s and he kept what was his.

  Unlike Storr, who had left Aren’s half-brothers with the loving couple. Half-brothers bred on Amazonia and brought to Ondrican when only a few days old. Aren supposed Basalia allowed Storr’s “visits” because she’d hoped to get a girl from him. When he bred only sons, she’d forbidden him to set foot on Amazonia again. If she learned Tage had stolen a female child, only the gods knew what she would do to Aren’s cousin. Or to him, since he would be much nearer once he and Kel reached “Amazonia”.

  “Heavy thoughts, m’lord?” Kel asked, stretching her arms over her head as she yawned.

  Her eyes were a thoughtful brown devoid of redness and swelling. Tak the gods, Basalia would not harbor resentment for Aren’s causing Kel pain. Or so he prayed.

  “A few,” he admitted, responding to Kel’s smile with one of his own. He counted himself fortunate that her snits were short lived.

  “Worrying that Basalia will hold you captive, perhaps? Wondering how many women she’ll force you to mate with before she lets you go?”

  “Were I not married to her daughter I might ponder those things. As it is…” He shrugged.

  “We aren’t mar— Never mind. There are a few customs you must observe while you visit us.”

  “Such as? If you expect me to kneel at her feet—” He sent Kel a warning glare. He had as much pride in who and what he was as she and Basalia had.

  “I don’t. Nor will she. She may kiss your cheeks. If she does, kiss hers. Otherwise, just nod to acknowledge her greeting.”

  “If she gives one,” he muttered.

  “Oh, she’ll greet you. She may even fondle your personal wealth to see if you deserve me. That’s the Amazonian way of judging a man’s worthiness.” Grinning, she winked.

  Aren shifted in this seat, wondering if his shaft and sac had truly drawn upward with Kel’s implied threat to his manhood. “Is that why you were still a virgin when you came to me? No man’s wealth deserved you?”

  Her eyes swirling, Kel said, “I never thought of that but you may be right. Should I ask her or will you?”

  Aren laughed. “If your eyes failed to reveal your teasing, I’d never leave the ship.”

  “Quaking in our boots, are we?”

  “Can’t speak for you, Kel, but I am.”

  * * * * *

  Amazonia

  From the air, Amazonia appeared completely flat. Tiny patches of deep green dotted an otherwise tan and brown landscape. Aren wondered if the images were real or only the illusion Basalia had agreed to reveal.

  “Oh,” Kel said, disappointment in her voice. “It’s even more desolate from up here than it is down there.”

  “Yet Amazonia has a reputation for beauty.”

  “I don’t see why. Ondrican is beautiful, whether viewed from Peg’s back or from the ground. This is…ugly.”

  “Its beauty lies in its women, Kel. In our galaxy Amazonia is renowned for its incomparable women.”

  “Perhaps I should blindfold you, lest you be tempted to betray…”

  “My marriage vows?” he taunted, knowing Kel had caught herself in kniqudac of her own making. Much as she wanted to deny him and their Ondrican marriage, she was beginning to feel married. Her words betrayed her true emotions.

  “I never realized my home was so large.” She pointed at the series of humps that looked more like sand dunes than structures. “Not all of it is housing. We do have a formal government, Aren. Some of the buildings are for those offices. More are for training and schools. We even—” She rubbed her belly. “We have a nursery where mothers and babes stay for a few weeks before and after birth.” Grinning briefly, she added, “Another kind of school, I guess, that teaches us how to care for the infants.”

  Suspecting Kel’s babbling was due to nerves, he said, “Everything looks so…round,” Aren said. As round as your breasts and buttocks, Kel.
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  In the far distance, he spotted a large patch of varying shades of green bisected by a wide blue stripe. “Your planet is not entirely devoid of beauty, Kel. Look there.” He tipped his spacecraft so she could see.

  “That’s where the invaders hide before they attack.” Her disparaging frown fading, she added, “Boas and skeetmosques and graackocrtos greet them. By the time they emerge, they are more than willing to surrender.”

  “Why don’t they assemble in the open? At least they could see your warriors coming at them. And they would be in better condition to fight.”

  Kel just grinned. He should have known she’d reveal nothing of her homeworld’s defenses.

  “No doubt that’s why Basalia instructed me to land here—so as to avoid the kniqudac and such.” Aren set his ship down in the exact center of the vast courtyard Basalia’s palace formed around it. Waving his hand, he widened the entire ship so he and Kel could debark side by side.

  “Neat,” she said, seeming oblivious to this new to her skill and tugging down her vest in a useless attempt to cover her bare torso. She looked down, apparently at the material covering her lower body from just below her navel to her thigh-high boot tops and huffed. “My clothes are so tight—Basalia will deplore how fat I’ve become.”

  But the first words out of the queen’s mouth were, “A breeder! By all the gods, Kel’s brought us a magnificent breeder.”

  And the speculative look Basalia raked over Aren—lingering on his personal wealth—had Kel announcing in a loud voice, “Majesty, may I present Prince Aren of Ondrican. My husband.”

  Fighting back a smile, Aren met his mother-in-law’s emerald gaze, and saw she fought laughter as well.

  Maybe this ruse will end happily after all.

  * * * * *

  What have I done? Once Kel told her mother—and half the women on Amazonia!—Aren was her husband, she had no choice except to accept him. Having accepted him, she would have to share her rooms with him. Eat every meal with him. Never have a private moment to think what the future held for her.

  Entering her receiving room, she strode to the wide, curved window overlooking her small garden. She wished she’d had a plant with the prickliest quills to stuff into her mouth before she said one word to her mother.

  Aren, she noted when she sought him, remained in her open doorway. His hand curved around the door’s rounded jamb.

  “Have you a book?” he asked.

  “A book?” she echoed as if she’d never heard the word.

  “Yes. And a chair to sit on while reading it. In another room of course.”

  “Another—?” Realizing she sounded like a ratrop, she shut her mouth.

  “You need time to think, Kel, before we can sort this out. Since I’ve little desire to spend time with Basalia, I thought I could read while you think. You seem to do your best thinking while bathing.”

  As if he had grown another head, Kel gaped at him. She hadn’t expected this…courtesy. Sensitivity, she silently corrected, wishing he were a brutish boor she could forget without caring.

  “Though not as luxurious as yours at your palace, I have a bathing room,” she said. Sweet Goddess, am I inviting him to join me or to remain here and read?

  Closing the door, he chuckled. “As I said, you seem to think best while you bathe.”

  “How would you know? While on Ondrican, I can count bathing alone on the fingers of one hand,” she countered, laughter in her voice. “And have several fingers left.”

  “Is that an invitation, Flame?”

  “Perhaps…not.” Sitting on the curved window seat, she studied him with fresh eyes. As if she had never seen him. Met him. Mated with him.

  His stature still impressed her. Imposing size, true. But his height and width seemed less important when she acknowledged his self-confidence. His innate power. The kindness in his eyes that overlaid the hint of humor in them. His lips, so firm and disciplined as he withstood her scrutiny. So soft and giving when he kissed her.

  His simple garb enhanced his appearance of power. His vest hugged his powerful torso, caressing pecs and rib cage Kel longed to touch. Clenching her fingers together, she folded her hands in her lap. His leather pants seemed to be painted over his skin, barely hiding his—

  “Since we will dine with Basalia and her council, I think a tunic or robe might be more—”

  “Appropriate for a married man,” he suggested.

  “Comfortable,” she countered, feeling the first hint of anger override lust and—as much as she abhorred it—jealousy. She found it intolerable that any woman would share her lust. View him as a sex machine she could have without thinking about Kel or Aren’s husband status. On the heels of jealousy came rage. A fury only destroying that guanshit prophecy cloth could assuage.

  “Where might I find a book, Kel?”

  Tempted to send the wretch to her mother’s library, Kel quickly reconsidered. Her mother had the greatest sexual appetite Kel had ever encountered. Kel doubted her marriage would keep the queen from seducing Aren. Given the opportunity—which Kel had no intention of providing.

  “Through that door.” She pointed at another curved wall. “I maintain a small library. You’ll find a variety of comfortable chairs in there as well.”

  Rising, she paced to another door in the same curved wall. “I think an hour’s thinking will leave me sufficiently reasonable for our discussion.”

  Threat or promise? Aren found it impossible to decide. Expelling his held breath, he entered Kel’s small library. Books filled shelf after shelf curved to match the half-moon walls. As crammed in as the books were, it looked as if Kel had more of them than he kept in the Princesses’ Palace and his lodge combined. A flash of pink from one of the lower shelves caught his attention. Hunkering down, he discovered the book spine was unreadable. He eased it from its wedged-in place between thicker tomes.

  “Pixie tales,” he said, grinning at yet another curved door, one he suspected led to Kel’s sleep chamber. Opening the book, he discovered a story he’d read to Drew before she grew and learned to read for herself.

  Following Kel’s growth up the bookcase shelves gave him a brief and far too sketchy insight into his wife’s complex mind. She read voraciously. Books he selected at random had well-worn pages, yet their spines showed little wear. She cared for her books as he prayed she would care for their children. And would pass on to them the knowledge she had garnered from reading.

  Military tactics from planets long ago destroyed by invaders or their own peoples. Philosophy and physical science. Paganism and single deities. Literature from worlds he’d only heard of crowded alongside books extolling fashion fads from bygone eras. Yet nowhere could he find a single tome about Amazonia. But then Kel had told them her world had only oral history.

  Hearing a door open, he returned to her receiving room, pleased to find Kel wearing the multicolored gown he had given her.

  “It seems,” she said, facing him, “the prophecy cloth is not the only fabric inclined to follow me. You’ll find your own clothes in my sleep chamber.”

  With a nod, he went to change, offended by her wording. My sleep chamber, not ours… So, she had thought about them but had yet to acknowledge their marriage. Not to herself anyway. Not in any permanent fashion.

  Somehow he had to make her see reason. Just how he hadn’t the smallest clue.

  Storr claimed he would tie a reluctant woman to the bedposts—standing, of course—and touch her everywhere she loved being touched. He’d have her watch couples or ménages fucking until she could bear it no longer but must have what others were having. He’d make her beg for release. A game Aren and Tage had played sometimes when off planet, with women who only pretended not to want to fuck.

  Kel seemed to arouse when watching the princesses fuck their mates. Watching others fuck had a certain appeal to Aren, but only as a last resort. He knew Kel’s body and its secrets. What he needed to learn were the secrets of her mind and of her heart.

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sp; If I ask Basalia for advice… Would she think him a fool, unworthy of her daughter’s love? Or would she read his heart and know he only wanted Kel’s happiness?

  When did I become such a romantic? he wondered, returning to Kel’s receiving room and finding her surrounded by six comely women in warrior garb and armed to the teeth.

  Kel shot him a chagrined look, saying, “Basalia wishes a few private moments before her council joins us for dinner.”

  “Very well,” Aren said, holding out his arm to Kel.

  Her companions tittered as if they’d never seen such a courtesy. Which they most likely had not. Kel shook her head slightly and remained where she was. One warrior opened the doors to the hallway. Kel went out while five females herded him along, the sixth joining them after she closed Kel’s doors.

  With Kel leading the procession, his guards indulged in comments concerning Aren’s appearance. They wondered if his body was as powerful as his biceps. They complained that his sleeveless robe hid too much, that they wished he’d dressed in clothes similar to those he’d arrived in so they could evaluate his assets. Although uncomfortable with their speculations, he took some pleasure in watching Kel’s back and shoulders stiffen. At the doors to what he assumed were Basalia’s quarters, Kel faced them. Her turn coincided with a lurid comment about the size of his shaft and how well he wielded it.

  Kel’s smile remained soft but her eyes swirled dark-gray and stormy-black. “The size of my husband’s cock and how he uses it are for me to know and for you to imagine only.”

  “Yes, Princess,” the warriors chorused, two springing forward to open the doors. Two others, a hand on each of his buttocks, urged him forward.

  Kel’s eyebrows quirked, as did the corners of her lips. “Whatever you imagine, you’ll fall far short,” she said, holding out her hand to him and winking at their escorts. “And keep your hands off my man.”

  With a gentle tug on his hand, Kel took him forward. The closing doors muffled the women’s laughter.